Belfast and Beyond

10:36am Tim Hancock, Campaigns Director and Colum McAndrew, Board member gave us the inside track on what went on at last year's International Council Meeting, our biennial global congress, which decides big policy, elects our...

10:10am We're solvent. Phew! (only joking – our financial position has remained strong for years). The Treasurer's report has the potential to rival the standing orders committee report in its mind-numbing tedium for the average...

9:22am I'm not being a crawler here, but Kate Allen has grown in stature and oratorical powers over the years since she became AIUK Director in 2000. I'm looking forward to hearing her speech. She opens up her annual address to the...

9:06 Alex Siddall is taking us through the welcomes and processes and sets a nice tone for the weekend ahead – good humoured, authoritative and respectful. AIUK Chair of the Board, Tom Hedley sets the scene. So will I. We're sitting in...

8:32am Okay. Ready? Well, I made it safely to the AGM (thanks for asking). Got to the Nottingham conference centre about quarter to nine last night – four hours door to door from the office in Belast, by car, plane, bus and coach. Not...

OK, off to the airport in a minute to catch the flight that will take me to what will be the capital city of our human rights world for the next few days – yes, that's right, Nottingham! Well, with its most famous son (not counting...

Martin Luther King Jr is a hero of mine. He had a belief in the dignity of man and made this real through his practice of nonviolence as a means of social change. Forty years ago today, he gave his "I have been to the mountaintop"...